and shame on you vultures, for trying to get me
by 2028
Summary: It was a beautiful transformation from a fledgling to an eagle. If only there was a volcano nearby.


"Calling it 'found' makes it seem like…" Drew opened the door, shoved it in and waited for Rick to follow before he kicked it shut. He made it to the kitchen and dropped the grocery bags on the table before he found the right word. "Calling it 'found' makes it seem like we just happened to find a winning lottery ticket on the sidewalk when in reality it was more like finding a…." Drew waved his hand in the air and walked back out to the car, Rick following him again "a fledgling that's still mostly blind."

"A mostly blind fledgling, that's how your describing the beginning of our relationship?" Rick asked, shutting the door to the car and locking it.

"Well, obviously it didn't stay that way but yea, it started out as a mostly blind fledgling that got kicked out of the nest and wandered around, banging its head on trees. The fledgling almost starves to death and has serious separation anxiety but eventually makes it to civilian and wanders about the city for a couple days trying to avoid being hit by cars. Then it finds a lottery ticket on the street and, not knowing its value, tries to make a nest out of it. The lotto ticket stays in that nest for a while and…" Drew kept talking as he unloaded soap and soup onto the kitchen table to distributed to their proper location.

"And then the city decides that fledgling nests are not allowed so it makes a law saying the fledgling has to go and the fledgling is like 'um, no jerk, I'm staying here' so the fledgling, who lets call Jeremy for brevity, so Jeremy goes on to learn the best ways to avoid the city employees and continues growing up, eating beef jerky."

"Beef jerky?" Rick cut in when Drew paused to take a breath.

"Yes, Rick" Drew said in mock anger "Let's say Jeremy eats beef jerky. He's a bird of prey after all."

"Okay, go on."

"And one day someone comes up to the nest and finds the lottery ticket and wants to steal it so Jeremy goes on the offense and flies away, taking the lottery ticket with him." Drew set a case of eggs on the table; they go through a lot of eggs; they like eggs.

"And on this journey, there are vultures but Jeremy kicks them in the face and continues to fly and along the way, the lottery ticket rips and a little piece drifts away. They are apart for a while, but Jeremy refuses to give up so he searches for the missing corner and eventually it finds its way back and Jeremy holds the whole thing tighter and refuses to let it out of his sight."

Rick realized the metaphor and had leaned back against the counter, listening to Drew describe their relationship in a very Drew like manner, emotional and telling but censoring the specifics so only they knew what he meant.

"And after that, still more vultures chase him but Jeremy now has friends who help fend them off and with their help he makes it to safety." Drew glanced up from folding shopping bags to see the table covered in groceries and Rick, propped against the counter, smiling at him.

"You stopped putting away the groceries. I am not doing this by myself." Drew said pointedly.

"I am listening to you write the next great American novel." Rick said lightly, wanting to laugh but containing himself.

"I am not writing a novel." Drew insisted.

"Finish the story, what happens to Jeremy, the now not a fledgling fledgling?" Rick asked, sticking the eggs in the fridge and the jar of peaches in the cabinet above the stove. They had planned on learning to make pie, but given it was January, they didn't have fresh fruit.

Drew turned self consciously, his face vaguely anger.

"He arrives in this safe place and his friends throw him a party for having reached it and Jeremy decides that he likes this life and could easily defend his new position from all vultures. So he stays and realized that along the way he gained something much more valuable than a lottery ticket. Then he lives happily ever after and the vultures all fall into a volcano and never bother him again."

"And that's the end?" Rick asked, having again taken his spot leaning against the counter. Drew's face captured the emotion behind the story and Rick couldn't resist soaking it in, given it popped up somehow rarely.

"Well, Jeremy learned to make peach pie and then lived happily ever and ate a lot of pie."

Rick grinned at the end of the story and at the sweet, embarrassed smile on Drew's face.

"I love this Jeremy fledgling."

"Jeremy is our relationship, not me."

"Love that too." Rick said simply. "Although I didn't know you were such a sap. You think I would have figured it out after all these years."

"I am not a sap." Drew said determinately.

"The story ends 'and they live happily ever after.' That's fairytale levels of sap."

"No, it is not." Drew said, over explaining. "It basically the same thing as 'until death do us apart.' The world is the way the world is; isn't marriage kinda of a fairytale in and of itself?"

Rick tilted his head with a sad smile; it's a bit like a fairytale.

"Plus" Drew continued. "It's also a goal. You know, don't die, don't get divorced, get old and grumpy etc."

"And throw our enemies into a volcano."

"Hey, if the shoe fits."

"People can actually make a fashion decision so ugly it ends with them being tossed into a volcano?" Rick asked, to see what kind of answer Drew could put up with on the spot.

"You are missing the point of the metaphor." Drew said, rolling his eyes, but the annoyance faded fast.

A light silence settled in the kitchen as they smiled at each other and after a few seconds Drew turned and a stack of cans on the lower shelf of the pantry.

"So, in essence, you are saying that meeting me was like winning the lottery?" Rick asked, clarifying since he had apparently missed the point of the metaphor. Drew turned around again, picked up a can of peaches that Rick had missed and walked toward him. When he got close enough, Drew reached out and picked up Rick's hand, threaded their fingers together and pulled the combined mass to shoulder height.

"No, I'm saying I found a slip of paper that turned out to make me more rich than any lottery ticket ever could." Drew held Rick's eyes for that, making some of the emotional resolve in his chest melt. Honestly whose wouldn't after being called more valuable than a winning lottery ticket. Then Drew squeezed his hand and stood on his tiptoes to place the peaches in the cabinet. When Drew dropped back down to meet his eye level again, he kept talking.

"And you are not getting an anniversary card this year because it is going to take me at least a year to top that…" Drew admitted, dragging the conversation back into the joking realm. "So deal with it."

"Can we still go out to dinner? No card required with that." Rick asked, after swallowing hard.

"Sure. You have to pay for it, though, because my lottery ticket turned out to be very handsome but not worth any money."

"You see, neither did mine." Rick said, stealing Drew's best material, but Drew topped anything he could have come up with it at the moment.

"So we'll have to stay in." Drew teased, trying and failing to pull off a completely casual look.

"Really a horrible tragedy." Rick said lightly, jokingly.

"What can you do?" Drew asked, shrugging deliberately.

They met eyes again, across the kitchen, over the table covered in groceries, so far from the nests they had been kicked out of, so free of the vultures who had tried to follow them. A grin lit up Drew's face; Rick had decided one of the first times he saw that grin that he liked seeing it and for years after had tried to keep the grin there, with varied success. Thankfully, however, the grin survived and continued to crop up.

"Finish putting away the groceries" Drew whispered after a second.

"I'm not doing it by myself." Rick whispered back, not at all talking about the food scattered around their kitchen.

Drew came around the edge of the table, his eyes settling solidly on Rick's, only serving to further demonstrate the statement Rick had just muttered.

"No, you're not. Promise."

THE END


End file.
